


Work in Progress

by Elizabeth Culmer (edenfalling)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Bad Days, Communication, Couch Cuddles, Couches, F/F, Frustration, Graduate School, Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, Ladystuck 2013 Treat, Massage, Multi, Pillow Fights, Threesome, Threesome - F/F/F, cheap apartments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-11
Updated: 2014-01-11
Packaged: 2018-01-08 07:55:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1130185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edenfalling/pseuds/Elizabeth%20Culmer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's hard being a graduate student, trying to write a thesis, create a revolutionary computer program, or prove the existence of dragons while living in a shitty apartment with your two girlfriends.  It's hard, but at least your girlfriends understand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Work in Progress

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scrunch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scrunch/gifts).



> This is a strange and novel threesome that had never occurred to me before I saw your prompt, but I think I like it. :-)

Roxy slammed open the apartment door, already in full-blown rant: "--to god, if I have to ask one more idiot if they remembered to plug in the fucking USB or turn on the computer, I am going to _cut a bitch_. Or setting up wireless printing accounts. Have I mentioned I hate setting up wireless printing accounts? Because hey, guess what, I hate setting up wireless printing accounts! My brain is utterly fried, and how the hell am I supposed to remember what good code looks like if all I do day in and day out is fix shitty freshman fuckups?"

Porrim looked over at her human matesprit, gauged her mood at genuinely shitty instead of pissed off largely for effect, and saved her latest attempt at chapter three of her thesis. It wasn't like she was getting anywhere useful anyway. Her words kept tangling back on themselves, either refusing to say what she meant or refusing to sound logical and persuasive. When she started sounding as preachy and tone-deaf as Kankri, it was definitely time for a break -- and she was the designated mostly-sane person this week.

"Work-study getting you down?" she said, setting her laptop on the coffee table and beckoning Roxy toward their Frankenstein-upholstered couch. "Here, lie down and let me rub your neck and shoulders while Latula gets some lemonade. You look hideously tense."

"You want I should grab some aspirin too, babez?" Latula asked, rolling gracefully to her feet, cryptozoology textbook and clutch of multicolored highlighters abandoned on the carpet.

"I want a fucking drink," Roxy said as she flopped onto the couch, head in Porrim's lap and legs slung over the battered, food-stained arm.

"Sorry, no can do. But hey, I tell you what. I got these hella weird stinky candles from Mituna the other day. Probably all kinds of herbal action going on, if you catch my drift." Latula wagged her eyebrows in exaggerated drama.

Porrim caught herself wondering yet again if her troll matesprit had been a mime in a past life. She stopped rubbing Roxy's temples for a moment, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. No. She wanted this relationship to last. She wouldn't hide her less attractive sides, but there was no need to be deliberately provoking either. "Candles and aspirin, but lemonade first. I think I'm getting dehydrated."

"Oh, you mean you're planning to dismantle the patriarchy with a chainsaw instead of sweet reason?" Roxy mumbled. "That's not dehydration. That's stone cold sanity. I've got a rifle and I know kung fu. Count me in." She squirmed, pressing her head down on Porrim's thigh until she resumed her massage.

"We can start with the university IT center," Latula said from their postage-stamp kitchen. "Radical babez stage shocking takeover at the end of a chainsaw; demand equality, respect, and users who aren't hopeless losers. News at eleven."

"And then we'd all be arrested and the cause would be set back another dozen years," Porrim said. "No."

"Ruin all our fun, why don't you," Roxy said. "Come on, you're our matesprit, not our moirail. You're supposed to go along with our crazy impulses instead of reining us in."

"The day you get a proper moirail instead of family and friends you either run roughshod over or manipulate into thinking you can do no wrong, I'll gladly consign that aspect of our relationship to the dustbin," Porrim said. "In the meantime, shoosh."

"Mad kinky, yo," Latula said, swaggering back into the room in a wave of smoky, perfumed air: something musky, something green, the intertwined scents tugging oddly at Porrim's wiggler memories of garden foliage crushed under the massive, unwieldy body of her lusus. She wondered what Mituna had put into his candles. Then, on second thought, she decided it was safer not to know.

Latula plopped two glasses of lemonade onto the coffee table and perched on the back of the couch, rucking up the afghan and insinuating her toes between the cushions and Roxy's torso. "I got a better idea than us playing fake-moirailz. It's Friday, none of us have papers due next week, we're all wound up. I say we hit the town."

Roxy opened her eyes and caught Porrim's gaze. For a moment, they were so strongly on the same wavelength, they might have been telepathic.

"Ugh," Roxy said.

"What? I know it sucks going to bars when you can't drink, but ain't no rule about dancing sober. And you both have some sweet moves I love to get down with," Latula said.

"I have nothing against dancing," Porrim said.

"But? I know there's a 'but,' I have a mad sixth sense for that word."

"But aren't you sick of people thinking, 'wow, three hot ladies, must be on the prowl, lemme see if I can pick one of them up?'" Roxy said. "Like, we could be littlerarly--"

"Literally," Porrim said before she could stop herself.

"--literally, whatever, sticking our tongues down each other's throats and and our hands into each other's panties, and we'd _still_ get creeps crawling out of the woodwork wanting to join in, like this is an open-invitation jam. I am so tired of that shit. Beyond tired. Even more tired than I'm tired of wireless printing accounts, and I never thought that was possible."

Latula was silent for a long moment.

"I don't mean to suggest you're wrong if you don't mind that kind of idiot," Porrim said. "Everyone has different boundaries and tolerances for--"

Latula waved her off. "Yeah, yeah, can the lecture, I dig what you're saying. I guess I got used to letting that kinda shit roll off, 'cause if I paid any attention to what people say about Mituna, or about me when I'm with him, well, highblood rage ain't got nothing on the carnage I'd start. But whatevs. I can save the dancing for my main dude, and the homebody stuff for my best dudettes."

"We're not-- no, hang on, can't speak for anyone but me, right? So okay, _I'm_ not saying I _never_ want to go out with you," Roxy said. "Just, I'd rather go somewhere super classy, or maybe an arcade or a water park. Not somewhere people are all geared up to hit on me and ignore that I'm already in a relationship. Plus I don't think I'm up for dancing tonight anyway. Headache, you know?"

"Oh, a _headache_ , mm-hmm, that's super-believable," Latula said, but she was smiling as she talked, on the edge of laughter.

"You'd better believe me, or I'll sic Porrim on you! You're maintaining the repressive power structure of the patriarchy and working against female solidarity!"

"Actually, I believe she's making what's commonly known as a joke," Porrim said dryly.

"You're a traitor to your sex and gender," Roxy said, waving a limp hand haphazardly in Porrim's direction. "Get your hands off my head. I refuse to accept a massage from you. Only Latula's fingers are worthy."

Porrim looked over at Latula, then looked pointedly at the hideous embroidered throw pillow trapped under Roxy's knees. "I suppose that means my lap is unworthy too? Such a shame."

She rolled her girlfriend off the couch. Latula seized the throw pillow; Porrim made do with the afghan.

By the end of the pillow fight, Roxy was nearly hyperventilating with laughter, IT travails and relationship woes tossed aside in favor of more hopeful things.

Mission accomplished, Porrim thought to herself, and returned to her thesis while her girlfriends bickered over what kind of takeout to order for dinner.

The words were still all wrong, but that was okay. She could fix them.


End file.
